November 2, 2007 - British student Meredith Kercher's body is
discovered in the apartment she shared with American student Amanda Knox
in Perugia, Italy. Kercher was found semi-naked in a pool of blood; her
throat had been slit.

November 19, 2007 - Police name Rudy Hermann Guede as fourth
suspect and arrest him the following day in Mainz, Germany. Meanwhile,
Lumumba is released without charge from a prison in Rome.

April 1, 2008 - A defense appeal to have Knox, Sollecito and
Guede released from prison is denied. The three suspects are told they
will stay behind bars until they are charged or released. The judges
rule that they can be held for up to a year while the case is
investigated.

October 28, 2008 - Guede is sentenced to 30 years in prison
for his part in Kercher's murder, but after a 2009 appeal the sentence
is reduced to 16. Judge Paolo Micheli also orders Knox and her Italian
boyfriend Raffaele Sollecito to stand trial on murder charges.

January 16, 2009 - Trial of Knox and Sollecito begins.

December 5, 2009 - Knox is sentenced to 26 years in prison and
her ex-boyfriend is sentenced to 25 years after the pair is convicted
of murdering Meredith Kercher during a drunken sexual assault. Lawyers
for Knox and Sollecito announce they will appeal the sentences and
Knox's family calls the guilty verdict a "failure of the Italian
judicial system."

November 8, 2010 - Knox is ordered to stand trial for
slandering police officers during the murder investigation, after
accusing them of beating her. The trail, separate from her murder trial,
began in May 2011 and was adjourned until Nov. 15, 2011.

November 24, 2010 - Knox and Sollecito's appeal begins and is adjourned. It resumes on December 11.

June 29, 2011 - Independent forensic report discredits police
evidence used to help convict Knox. The report claimed that key DNA
evidence was unreliable or contaminated.

July 25, 2011 - Two court-appointed experts, Carla Vecchiotti
and Stefano Conti, testify at an appeal hearing that a knife thought to
have been used to kill Kercher carried no trace of blood but may have
been contaminated with other DNA traces.

September 23, 2011 - Prosecutors display grisly crime scene photos.

September 24, 2011 - Prosecutors ask the court to keep Knox and Sollecito behind bars for life.

September 26, 2011 - Patrick Lumumba's lawyer Carlo Pacelli
tells the appeals court that Knox's lies destroyed his reputation and
calls Knox a "she-devil." Knox had accused Lumumba of killing Kercher
during initial questioning, but later claimed she had been under
pressure from police.

October 3, 2011 - The appeals court overturns both Knox and Sollecito's murder convictions. The two are released from jail immediately.